Technology Bulletin
from the drying experts at Conair
How Dryers Work
By Rich Shaffer, Director of Engineering & Technology
and Jamie Jamison, Dryer Product Manager
Today, processors are confronted with more drying options
than ever before. Ads and articles in the plastics magazines
tout faster drying, lower energy consumption and a host of
other benefits. But, how do they actually work? And, more
importantly, how well do they actually work? The truth is, they
all work to some degree and all have a place in plastics
processing. However, no single approach provides a solution
to all drying requirements. Thats why it is critical to under-
stand the capabilities and limitations of the various dryer
designs and evaluate them critically against the requirements
of your application. And to do that, you first need to under-
stand some basic principles of drying.
There are two major classes of polymers: hygroscopic
materials engineering plastics that have a strong affinity
for moisture and non-hygroscopic commodity resins that
require minimal drying. Non-hygroscopic resins usually
accumulate only what is called surface moisture, which is
not usually a concern in most applications, but if necessary,
it can be dealt with easily with hot-air dryers. On the other
hand, when hygroscopic materials are exposed to moisture,
the water molecules form a secondary bond with the polymer
molecules deep inside the resin pellet. If these molecular
bonds are not broken and the moisture is not extracted
from the pellet before melt processing, it can cause streaks,
bubbles, burning, brittleness and other critical defects in the
molded or extruded part. Whats required for drying these
materials is a dryer that heats each pellet completely, breaks
the moisture/polymer bonds, and moves the moisture to the
pellet surface where it can be carried away, leaving the resin
ready for processing.
To understand how dryers work and what makes some drying
technologies different from others, you need to understand
the four basic parameters of drying. These are:
Temperature As the temperature of the polymer is
increased, the molecules move about more vigorously.
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This allows the water molecules to escape from the polymer
chains. Heat also causes air to expand, reducing the
concentration of water molecules in it, making the air more
able to absorb more water. (See Moisture Concentration
Differential below.)
Time Plastics is not a good thermal conductor, so it takes
time for heat to penetrate to the center of each pellet and for
the moisture to migrate to the surface. How much time
depends on a number of factors including the specific type
of resin being dried and the method of heating being used.
Moisture Concentration Differential This refers to the
amount of moisture in the resin versus the amount of moisture
in the air surrounding it. Dryer experts will often refer to dew
point, which is the temperature at which water will condense
out of air. Dew point varies depending on the number of water
molecules in the air. Very moist air will have a high dew point,
while dry air will have a low dew point. Surrounding a moist
resin pellet with dry (low-dew-point) air, will encourage water
from the pellet to migrate more readily into the air.
Air Flow In all dryers, air flow is the mechanism by which
moisture is removed from around the plastic pellets. Air that
has a low moisture concentration is blown through the
material bed so that it absorbs water molecules from the resin
and carries them away. In some dryers the air flow is also
what is used to heat the material being dried. Depending on
the dryer design, the air is may be either vented or recycled.
With these basic drying parameters in mind, then, we can now
review the various drying technologies, examining how they
function and, more importantly, how well they function.
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Hot Air Dryers
The most basic kind of dryer is the hot-air dryer. It functions
in much the same way that a hand-held hair dryer works.
Ambient air is heated to reduce its moisture concentration
and then blown into the bottom of a drying hopper. As the hot
air rises through the bed of plastic pellets in the hopper, surface
moisture evaporates and is carried away by the dryer airflow.
Because the heated air used in hot-air dryers has a relatively
high dew point (same as ambient air), its ability to absorb
moisture is limited and hot air dryers are not very effective in
drying hygroscopic materials to low final moisture levels.
Desiccant Dryers
For a dryer to be effective in removing moisture from a hygro-
scopic resin, it needs to create a greater moisture concentra-
tion differential between the pellet and the air surrounding it.
In a desiccant dryer, this is accomplished by passing the air
through a molecular sieve desiccant, which actually removes
moisture from the air, reducing its dew point to -40F (-40C),
a level that has become the industry standard.
Aftercooler/
Intercooler
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Next, the air is heated to the drying temperature specified by the
resin manufacturer usually between 150 and 375F (65 and
190C), further lowering the moisture concentration of the air.
This hot, dry air is then blown into the bottom of the drying
hopper, where it raises pellet temperatures, exciting the water
and polymer molecules and breaking the bond between them.
Because of the moisture concentration gradient between the
polymer and the air, moisture diffuses from the hot pellets.
The drying air then exits the hopper, carrying away moisture
drawn from the polymer. This moist air is channeled back to the
desiccant where it again gives up that moisture before getting
reheated and making another pass through the drying hopper.
Eventually, the desiccant itself will become saturated with
moisture, which must be removed through a process called
regeneration. High-temperature air is blown through the desic-
cant, drawing out moisture and venting it away from the dryer.
The original desiccant dryers, invented more than 50 years ago,
used two large barrels of loose desiccant. For this reason, they
became known as twin-tower dryers. One tower would be used
Todays state-of-the-art Carousel
Plus dryers use desiccant in a
continuously rotating wheel that
turns through in-process,
regeneration and cooling stations.
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in the drying process while the other would be regenerated.
Because of the volume of desiccant involved, these dry-
ing/regeneration cycles were quite long, with significant
swings in dew point resulting. Later designs, perfected by
Conair, used multiple smaller canisters of desiccant in a
rotating carousel arrangement, which made the process
much more stable. Todays Conair Carousel Plus dryers
take the process a step further, using desiccant that is grown
into a fiberglass substrate and formed into a continuously
rotating wheel. Thousands of small air channels allow process
and regeneration air to flow past the desiccant. While most
of the wheel (about 75%) is being used to dry the to-process
air, the rest of the surface is undergoing high-temperature
regeneration and cooling.
Because they are able to achieve such stable, low-dew-point
drying conditions, todays Carousel Plus dryers have become
the gold standard for drying hygroscopic materials. They are
even used for secondary drying of resin that has been partially
dried by other methods.
Carousel dryers are noted for the ability to bring more fresh
desiccant on-line per hour and efficiently remove moisture
from process drying air without radical shifts in dew point
or temperature, either of which could compromise dryer
performance.
Optional Membrane
{
Pressure Gauge
Isolation Valve
From Plant Distribution System
(40F (4.5C) Dew Point)
Filter Filter
Membrane
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Compressed-Air Dryers
A recently introduced alternative to desiccant dryers,
compressed-air dryers can be quite simple and easy to maintain.
They use a more or less conventional drying hopper, but rather
than recirculating the drying air in a closed loop, this system
uses compressed air in an open loop. A plant compressor
system starts with cool ambient air and compresses it to
approximately 100 psi (1450 bar), which causes a certain
amount of water vapor to condense out of the air, lowering its
dew point to about 40F (4.5C). That air is then supplied to the
compressed-air dryer. When the compressed air is introduced
to the hopper and allowed to expand to normal atmospheric
pressure, its dew point drops to 0F (-18C), which could be
sufficient to dry in many applications throughout most of the year.
This dry air then makes a single pass through the hopper before
being exhausted, along with moisture, outside the hopper.
To lower moisture levels to near the industry standard -40
dewpoint, special membrane filters can be introduced to
physically remove water molecules from the compressed air.
This novel approach to drying has several advantages. The dry-
ing system, which has extremely simple controls and no moving
parts in the dryer itself, is very reliable and easy to use. The air
compressors can be located away from the plant floor, freeing
up valuable production space and confining maintenance work
to the remote compressor room. It can also be energy efficient in
Material In Air Out
Heater
When compressed air is introduced
to the hopper and allowed to
0F (-18C) Dew
expand to normal atmospheric
Point Drying Air
pressure, its dew point drops to
Material Out 0F (-18C), which can be sufficient
in many applications.
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applications where the volume of material to be dried is
relatively small and the amount of compressed air required
is limited. However, compressed air dryers are rarely
economical for high-throughput applications.
Infrared Dryer
Almost all dryers used in polymer processing today use elec-
tricity or gas to heat the resin and the drying air. Today, how-
ever, there are dryers that use infrared energy to heat material
and despite relatively high equipment costs, infrared dryers
(IRD) seem to have distinct advantages in certain applications.
IRDs have a large, horizontal rotating drum which is fitted
with infrared lamps positioned to irradiate pellets as they flow
through the drum. The infrared radiation heats the plastic,
exciting molecules so that moisture is driven off. A flow of
ambient air through the drying chamber picks up the moisture
and carries it away, along with any dust thrown off as material
tumbles in the drum. The air is extracted and vented through
an exhaust pipe and into a dust filter if necessary.
The most common IRD application involves PET regrind,
especially bottle and sheet flake. Here, users can take
advantage of the fact that the IRD both dries and crystallizes
at the same time, and it does so in a fraction of the time it
Screw feeder Drum with welded helix
Cool resin in Dry resin out
Infrared lamp modules
Cooling air supply for infrared module
In infrared dryers, pellets are heated by infrared lamps as
they flow through a large, horizontal rotating drum.
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takes in a conventional desiccant dryer and separate crystallizer.
Typical residence time required to reach moisture levels of 300
ppm in the IR dryer is about 15 minutes, rather than the 4
to 6 hours required using a desiccant dryer and crystallizer.
To reach a moisture level of 50 ppm, which can be required in
some applications, it may be necessary to finish drying the PET
for about an hour in a desiccant dryer. This is still considerably
faster than the 6 to 8 hours required in a desiccant dryer alone.
Additional benefits include the fact that the amount of material
in process at any time is reduced 80 to 95%. The horizontal
configuration of an IRD also requires less head room and can
be installed in low-ceiling-height applications.
Vacuum (Low-Pressure) Dryer
Another dryer design that does not use desiccant is the vacuum
or low-pressure dryer. Its manufacturer claims it can dry material
faster than a desiccant dryer and, indeed, material cycles
through the vacuum-drying process in just 40 minutes. The dryer
uses small-volume canisters that rotate through three positions.
At the first position, resin is loaded into the canister and heated
by a flow of heated ambient air for about 20 minutes. Then the
canister is rotated to the vacuum drying position, where it is
sealed and pressure is lowered. This weak vacuum leaves a
relatively low moisture concentration around the pellets and this,
in turn, is said to draw moisture out of the pellets.
Material Inlet
Vacuum Outlet
Stage 1:
Fill and Heat
Stage 2: Vacuum
Material to Process
Stage 3:
Resin Ready for Processing
Vacuum dryers extract air from a sealed container to
create a relatively low moisture concentration around the
pellets that is said to draw moisture out of the pellets.
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Vacuum drying is a viable technology that has been used
successfully for many years in the textile industry. However,
these textile-industry vacuum dryers are large-capacity (5 to 20
tons or 4500 to 18,000 kg of material) batch dryers that draw
a very deep vacuum using a two-stage vacuum system. First a
piston-driven vacuum generator draws the vacuum to nearly
29 inches of mercury (0.97 atmospheres). Then a lobe-type
vacuum generator draws it ever so slightly closer to a perfect
vacuum. In contrast, the low-pressure vacuum dryer now being
marketed to plastics processors uses a compressed-air venturi
type vacuum generator, which its manufacturer admits can only
achieve about 27 inches of mercury (0.9 atmospheres) a
relatively weak vacuum.
Unlike a desiccant dryer, which operates consistently regard-
less of ambient conditions, the performance of any vacuum
dryer is very dependent on the starting moisture content of
the drying air. If the starting dew point is a low 20F (-6.7C),
which is typical in a heated plant during the winter, we know
there are 1.24 grains (0.8g) of water per pound of air. A
vacuum of 27 inches of mercury (0.9 atmospheres) would
reduce the moisture content to 0.133 grains (0.0086g) per
pound or the equivalent of a -24F (-31C) dew point well
above the -40 dew point recommended by resin manufactur-
ers for optimum drying of most materials. The closed-loop
desiccant circuit in Conair dryers, however, always achieves
a dew point of -40 or 0.05 grains (0.0032g) of water per
pound of air.
If the starting dew point rises to 50F (10C), which is typical
of unconditioned plant air during summer months, a desiccant
dryer will still consistently produce -40 drying air. On the
other hand, a vacuum dryer pulling 27 inches of mercury (0.9
atmospheres) on that same 50F (10C) dew point air, will
only reduce the moisture content to 0.44 grains (0.029g) of
water per pound of air the equivalent of a -1F (-18C) dew
point. Vacuum drying, therefore, is very dependent on the
ambient conditions before the vacuum is pulled and requires
extremely low vacuum levels to be at all effective.
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WPD2-1109
There also are a few problems specific to the design of the
vacuum dryers being marketed to plastics processors. First,
once the canister indexes into vacuum station, no further heat
is applied and so the pellets immediately begin cooling off
and the excited molecular motion begins to diminish. Second,
once the vacuum is applied, there can be no movement of
air or water molecules out of the canister unless there is
some leakage of air into the canister for the vacuum pump
to extract. In fact, the manufacturer does say that the pump
remains active in order to make up for any loss of vacuum
due to leakage. The problem is that any leakage would allow
moist ambient air into the canister, actually counteracting
some of the drying taking place.
None of this means that vacuum drying doesnt work. It is
really a question of how well it works. The moisture levels
vacuum dryers achieve may be acceptable for some applica-
tions but not others. Regardless of manufacturer claims, a
desiccant dryer will always outperform a vacuum dryer of the
type used for machine side resin drying, and the deficiency
of these units becomes even more obvious at times when you
need a dryer the most during humid summer months.
Conclusion
There has been a lot of talk about new dryer technology and
some of these new approaches offer distinct advantages in
specific applications. However, the desiccant dryer is still
the Gold Standard the technology that most resin manu-
facturers trust. Understanding how different dryers work, you
can more easily decide which is right for your application.
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